Some Things Never Change
by leafs nation
Summary: We follow Ferb as he reuinites with old friends, makes some choices that he definately isn't proud of, and eventually finds his own place in this crazy, mixed-up world.
1. My Life as a University Junkie

_I find that the best things in this world are the ones that you're involved in yourself. Every day I spent during the summer vacations of my childhood were always fulfilling and- _"Bloody hell, this is sounding cheesier than usual!"

I tossed the now useless paper over my shoulder in exasperation. Needless to say essay writing was not something that I enjoyed doing at all.

Oh, by the way, the name's Ferb, and yes, I've grown up quite a bit since those amazing days where I could build whatever my innocent heart desired. I was currently in my 2nd year at Princeton, in the engineering program (shouldn't really be much of a shock to you). For some reason one of my professors decided it would be an "excellent experience" for the class to write a 2000 word essay on something that had nothing to do with engineering whatsoever, and it was due the next day. Oh, and he said that this mark didn't even count for anything and that he wanted to "see you grow as an individual".

So yes, I was pretty pissed off about it.

For some reason all of my thoughts for this assignment lead straight back to my friends and all the stuff we did. Whatever we made was only for our enjoyment, not for any economic or governmental value. That's partly why I loved doing it so much.

As the years went by, we started getting older and pursued different interests. Buford got tired of bullying Baljeet all the time, and by the time he was in grade 11 he joined the football team, the weightlifting club and even the anime club (Stunkelberry Finkbat was something that he just couldn't stay away from). Baljeet started following the wrong crowd in an effort to be cool, and he ended up getting heavily into drugs until we snapped him out of it. He and Buford are actually starting up their own company from what I've heard.

Candace and Jeremy broke off their relationship for a while after he moved out west to study law. She ended up living with Stacy in an apartment just outside Danville, where she got an internship in financing. Candace and Jeremy reunited for the first time in 7 years when he moved back to work at the Danville Court of Law. They're now engaged with the wedding coming next month.

Phineas' big ideas attracted many different company managers, but he turned down all but one of the offers he received. The one that he did agree on gave him a steady-paying job ($800 000 a year isn't a bad salary at all) where he works with investors to promote new gadgets and such things. He slowly started to figure out his feelings for the Hispanic girl across the street when he was nearing the end of his high school career, but they weren't nearly as focused on her as her feelings were on him all those years. Even though he went on a couple of dates in college and even got into a real relationship at one point, he's currently single.

Speaking of Isabella, she's actually here at Princeton with me, trying to go into the teaching profession. She kind of outgrew her crush on Phineas as the years went by, since nothing was really happening between the two of them. She figured that if attracting the boy of her dreams wasn't working, then she'd be better off staying close friends and not have to worry about all of the heartbreak that came along with it. At least… that's what she told me, anyway.

As for myself, my shy habits slowly dissipated after I realized that Vanessa never saw me as anything more than a friend. I continued to help Phineas strive for his goal of making the best day ever, which in the end was more fulfilling. Now about that essay…

Since it wasn't going to affect my grade, I decided to tell the prof that my roommate Kenny ate my homework, which given how messy the kid was I think he'd believe it.

I threw my paper right at his head, but he was too engrossed in his Skyrim game to pay it any notice.

"Ken, I think you may have a problem there bud," I warned him.

He shook his head but kept on playing the game. "No, I'm fine dude, really… Oh no! A giant just knocked out my dog! That bitch is gonna pay!"

I just sighed in exasperation and said, "You're hopeless, man. Hopeless." Instead of further pursuing this pointless conversation, I walked over to the kitchen counter to see if I had gotten any new messages.

_1 new message from: Fireside Girl Leader Troop 46321_

'She really needs to change her name on this thing' I thought to myself.

I opened up the little icon on my phone to read this:

_Yo Ferb, I've got some old friends coming over to my dorm tonight, gonna get WASTED! Lol jk u should come though too. Around 9 30ish, ight? Love ya! _

I chuckled quietly and shook my head. "Some things never change, I suppose."

Looking at my watch, it was already 9:21, so I grabbed my leather jacket and prepared myself for babysitting another drunk Isabella and the Fireside Girls.

Thanks for reading folks, and please review! I'll try to get the next chapter up soon!


	2. Night is Young

Isabella and I had been the best of friends for years, ever since we could remember. She came to me with nearly all of her problems (99% of them were about my oblivious step brother). She told me that I was the only one who ever really listened to what she had to say, instead of interrupting and giving her rash answers that only lead to her being even more depressed.

When the time came that Izzie told me she was over Phineas, I was shocked to say the least. For the last 10 years she had come to me as her confidant about the triangle-headed boy, and it all came to an abrupt halt. I guess she figured that if Phineas hadn't noticed her after all that time, then there was no point in pursuing it. She hasn't seen him for 2 years now.

As I walked through the frigid air on the way to her dorm, my thoughts returned to Phineas and his wild imagination. I'd always admired his creative capacity and willingness to believe that every day meant something. I wished that I could be so optimistic.

Isabella greeted me with a warm smile as she opened her door, her hair no longer with that bright pink bow, and she in a tank top and black sweat pants. "Come on in, bud. We've been waiting for you to show."

"We?" I asked, not knowing who she meant. I hung my coat on the hanger only to turn around and be engulfed in a huge hug.

"Miss me bro?" came the voice of my sister, Candace.

I smiled at her and shrugged my shoulders. "I don't know, it has been a lot quieter around here," Candace playfully shoved me and walked over to where Isabella was now sitting. "What are you doing here though? I thought you were with your fiancée in Danville."

"She was, but I called her the other day so that we could hold her bachelorette party… well, her, Stacy, me and some of her other friends. You get to hang with Jeremy at his bachelor party."

Looking around the room, I noticed that there was a lack of Jeremy, or anyone else for that matter. Noticing my observation, Isabella continued, "Oh, it's bad luck for the bride to see the groom during these things, or at least that's what Buford told me. He probably just wanted an excuse to go out partying without any of us…"

"Buford's coming? Does that mean…" I was interrupted as a series of knocks were heard at the front door. I went to open it only to unexpectedly find Irving at the front door.

"Oh, hi Ferb! I see that you guys have started already. This is gonna be so much fun!"

"HEY! MOVE IT ON IN FRONT!"

"Oh, and I brought them too." Irving stepped to the side to reveal Buford, Baljeet, Jeremy and Phineas. I immediately shook all of their hands, congratulated Jeremy and did our secret handshake with Phineas.

"Hey, Candace! Long time no see!" Phineas exclaimed, excited as ever.

Said woman rolled her eyes and sighed, "Phineas, that was yesterday, and I still haven't busted you for turning my car into a jet."

"It's a super-sonic jet! It's so cool, it can do loop-de-loops and fly at speeds that are almost as fast as the speed of light! I just improved the old Beak suit that we had and-"

Isabella shut him up by tackling him in a bone-crushing hug that sent them both on the pavement outside.

Everyone looked at each other as the two of them rolled onto the grass, laughing as they did so. Over him, yeah, sure…

"Anyways, what are we going to do this evening? I should not be out too late, for I need to write 3 assignments that are due in a month."

"Seriously, Jeet? This is a party! Lighten up a little, we can fix out your wussy problems later," Buford exasperated.

Baljeet slowly nodded in agreement. "Yeah, we should- hey, wait a minute!"

I decided to go with Candace to look for some alcoholic beverages that we would definitely need for this night to go anywhere. As we raided Isabella's tiny fridge for the drinks, we started talking to each other, brother to sister.

"It's hard to believe that my older sister is going to be Mrs. Candace Johnson, er, is that what you're going with?"

Candace shrugged her shoulders in response. "I haven't really decided yet. I suppose it has a bit of a ring to it, but whatever happens, happens. So what about you, Ferb? Have you found anyone worthwhile yet?"

"Not really, no. Well, I shouldn't say that. Isabella's awesome, but I consider her as more of a friend than anything like that. And Vanessa…"

Candace put a finger to my lips. "I don't want my brother to be upset tonight. You'll find someone you really care about, Ferb. I can promise you that."

I nodded my head and gave her my signature thumbs up. She giggled and called me a knucklehead, then continued to hand me bottles of Budweiser and Labatt Blue. I wasn't even that much of a heavy drinker, but this was a celebration, so I was obliged to take part in it.

Suddenly, a car horn blasted through the door, signalling someone's arrival. "Stacy's here with the girls, Candace! We're heading out!" Isabella yelled. Candace grabbed some of the remaining drinks and walked out towards Stacy's vehicle. After waving good bye to them, only the guys were left in Isabella's dorm.

"So, what do you guys feel like doing tonight?" Jeremy asked, slightly unsure of himself.

Buford raised his hands slightly and said, "It's your shindig dude, we do what you want to do."

"Well, until we think of something, why don't we head out back and drink some of this beer?" Phineas suggested. I never, ever thought that I would hear my brother say those words until tonight.

We set up some lawn chairs that Baljeet had brought over with him and started ingesting the liquid. Joking about how everyone's love lives sucked except for Jeremy's, we laughed and shared stories of our lives. It was sort of a unanimous decision that Jeremy's soon-to-be last night of staghood should be full of adventure and fun, so we started thinking of places to go and things to do. I'll admit, my judgement seemed to be a bit blurry at that point in the night, but it would've seemed normal compared to what was about to go down.

"How about the casino?" Baljeet suggested, to which everyone promptly agreed to.

This would become a night to remember indeed.


	3. Casino Battle Royale

We each gave the cab driver his fee and hopped out of the taxi, amazed at what we saw. It almost seemed as if all of the world's electricity was concentrated in this one location. There were signs of the strangest nature, from rodeo events to auto show locations. However, the real exciting part was the casino itself.

There was a huge red carpet leading up to the entrance, and on every wall that we saw there was a picture of a big, fat man wearing a white tuxedo, with his cat on his right arm and him in different kinds of poses. I could only assume that he was the owner of this joint.

"Well, gentlemen," Phineas began, rubbing his hands together while he spoke, "what sort of shenanigans shall we partake in tonight? Card games? Dice rolling? Slot machines?"

"Who are you and what have you done with my brother?" I asked jokingly, although at the moment I'm sure that I was being completely serious.

Buford leaned on Baljeet's shoulder while he spoke. "Oh yeah, man! We should totally do whatever the hell you just said… I'm sorry, I'm a little bit drunk right now, who are you people?"

Baljeet threw Buford's arm off and sighed. "Does anyone really know how much he drank before he got here… uh, guys?" We had all run off before he got to finish his question. My attention was mainly focused on the card games, as the other two things I felt were only based on luck, while cards took actual skill to win. Jeremy and Phineas were starting off at the blackjack table, so I decided to join in on the action.

_2 hours later…_

"Wow, Ferb! I didn't think it was possible for someone to lose that badly at a card game. It's a good thing that we're just playing for fun over here and that you owned at the actual gambling table, eh?"

Phineas was currently kicking my butt at President, but in my defence the remainder of my latest beer was starting to take its course. I had won about $42 at the blackjack table and decided that was enough. It wasn't quite as interesting as I'd thought it would be, but Jeremy, Buford and Baljeet seemed to be having a grand old time. Speaking of which…

"WOOHOO! I win again losers!" Buford shouted at his opponent, which yes, was the slot machine. Baljeet was just laughing along with him now, as he too was beginning to feel the effects. Jeremy had gone to the bathroom about 15 minutes ago, so we were getting slightly worried. Phineas put his hand down and volunteered to go see how he was doing.

Me, being the courteous and fair-playing man of action I was, looked at the cards that he had and slightly changed some of his cards to give me the advantage. Grinning mischievously, I quickly put his hand back down as he returned, Jeremy in tow.

Phineas had given him a cup of water from one of the casino waiters nearby, as he wasn't looking as good as he usually did. My thoughts of him stopped short however, as we all heard some shouting coming over from the dice game.

"I wasn't cheating, dude! You can't prove anything! Check my pockets, I dare you," Buford drunkenly raged, "See? Nothing there!"

As he pulled out his pockets, a pair of dice fell onto the table.

Buford grinned sheepishly as Baljeet slowly started to back away, embarrassed.

A nearby card dealer examined the dice with his hand scratching his chin. "Just as I suspected! These dice are loaded," he exclaimed, "you, my kind sir have been cheating. I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to leave. Now."

Buford shook his head and pointed his finger at the man. "You don't have the authority to do that to me, 'sir'! How dare you make that accusation!"

"I don't know him…" Baljeet lied.

I felt that it was time to intervene, but by the time that I stumbled clumsily over to the table, the fat owner came over, face red with anger.

"Get out of my casino before I get my boys here to forcibly remove you!" he yelled.

Buford wasn't having any of it. He stood up on the table and started chanting out incomprehensible sentences. How he didn't break the table was a shock to me, but I've got to say that a lot of things in my life happened that way.

The owner had enough of the foolishness, so he snapped his fingers and ordered his security guards to grab him.

"Let me go! I am Thor, the god of lightning! WOOSH! I just knocked you out with my thunder hammer!" Buford bizarrely yelled out.

The owner then pointed at the rest of us and told his team of now eight security guards to kick us out too.

As they started to drag us out of the casino, Buford and Jeremy broke free of their grip and tried to make a run back for the blackjack table. Naturally, we all went to join them, only to all be tackled to the ground by more security guards.

Now, I felt that they were taking the whole concept of "kicking us out of the casino" a little too literally. At least, that's what I felt while rubbing my behind from the unfriendly manner that they removed us. Picture us all landing in a big pile of bodies on the pavement, and that's how it felt.

We all complained to each other about how sore we were, everywhere. How we didn't get stopped by the cops after Buford and Baljeet threw a couple of choice words at an elderly couple out for an evening walk was beyond me. Of course, we all felt that they were being hilarious at the time, so it seemed a little light-hearted.

"Man, hasn't tonight been great so far? I don't think I've ever had so much fun in my entire life! Even… even one of our silly projects doesn't compare to this shit right here, eh… eh Ferbooch?" Phineas' words were slurred, but I understood what he meant.

Jeremy finally seemed to be talking again, so he pitched in, "Yeah, dude… Tonight has friggin' rocked so far! It's too bad that we won't be able to do this sort of thing anymore after tonight though."

Baljeet's eyes went wide and he started, "Oh no! Really?! But I've had sooooo much fun, dudes!"

I shook my head and chuckled. I would never get used to this sort of thing happening all the time. I was about to say something about it when I realized something really urgent.

"Oh bloody hell, mates! Where's Irving?!"

Everyone instinctively looked around them for any sign of him, since for some reason we thought he'd be here.

Buford laughed out loud and asked, "Ha ha, yeah, where is that little fanboy?"

We all tried to think of where we could've possibly left him, until Jeremy suddenly burst out laughing.

"What's so funny, man?" Phineas asked, a smile creeping on his face.

Jeremy had tears of laughter in his eyes as he explained, "We- ha ha- we left him in the trunk of the taxi! _Daaamn! _Ha, ha hoo!"

Everyone burst out laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world. It was true, before we got a ride from the cab driver, we told him that we had some luggage to take with us, since nobody wanted to pay for Irving to get a ride. We ended up forgetting all about him in the back trunk of the taxi.

I was still chuckling like a school boy when I asked, "Do you… Do you think we should, you know, like, go back for him?"

Buford shook his head and said, "Nah, don't worry about him. I'm sure he's fine in there."

We continued to walk down the road in our pursuit of the best drunken night ever.

_Meanwhile, in the taxi…_

"Mmmf! Guys? GUYS! THIS ISN'T FUNNY ANYMORE!"

Irving whimpered as he tried desperately to reach his friends.

"…it's really dark and stuffy in here…"

The poor kid then hit his head on the roof of the trunk as the taxi went over a speed bump.

"OW! What did I ever do to you, man?! Guys! Please let me out of here! I have to go to the bathroom!"

Hey guys, I know that I don't normally write about this stuff, and I totally don't condone this type of behaviour lol. But I thought that since it was Jeremy's bachelor party, they would obviously be doing this kind of stuff.

Besides, it's pretty funny for a fanfic ha ha. Anyway, hope you've enjoyed it so far.


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